Xwindows should now start. Please keep in mind that although you can do 'big desktop' or 'dual head' mode, Xinerama will not work with fglrx, so you cannot have intelligent window management. You can have either two screens or one desktop where the 'task/tab/status' bar runs across both monitors.

This was tested and verified on an ABIT AT7-MAX2 with an ATI Radeon 9700 Pro.

For KT400 (AGP 8x/3.0) boards & ATI cards, instead of emerge ati-drivers you must compile from source and apply this patch.

If you're running a 2.6 kernel, and either the 3.2.0 or 3.2.4 drivers, with "UseInternalAGPGART" set to "no", then AGP 8x should also work with KT400(A) boards.

cuban wrote:

I do not know if this works above fglrx 2.9.13.

The patch will apply to 3.2.0 and 3.2.4, but I can't check if it works, I don't have a KT400. You could create a bug and post the patch, it doesn't look like it'd be difficult to add it to the ebuilds._________________Per Ardua Ad Astra
The Earth is the cradle of the mind, but we cannot live forever in a cradle - Konstantin E. TsiolkovskyGentoo Radeon FAQ

UseInternalAGPGART controls whether you use the AGP support contained in the driver (when it's set to "on" or "yes"), or the AGP support in the kernel (when it's set to "off" or "no"). There may be a small performance difference between them, but if you use the kernels AGP support it's still accelerated. Last time I checked, I got exactly the same performance with UseInternalAGPGART on and off._________________Per Ardua Ad Astra
The Earth is the cradle of the mind, but we cannot live forever in a cradle - Konstantin E. TsiolkovskyGentoo Radeon FAQ

This is an X-Windows setting correct? I will compare performance possibly tonight. Does this method still utilize FGLRX? If so, Xinerama still cannot be used. Which makes the method I listed, and the one you listed practically the same. Xinerama complains about no DRM.

This is an X-Windows setting correct? I will compare performance possibly tonight. Does this method still utilize FGLRX?

Yes, it's only set in your XF86Config. You still use the fglrx module, but the AGP support comes from the kernel, not the module itself. Some AGP chipsets aren't supported by the module, or the support doesn't always work, so some people have to turn it off.

cuban wrote:

If so, Xinerama still cannot be used. Which makes the method I listed, and the one you listed practically the same. Xinerama complains about no DRM.

The two methods should have the same effect, and yours has the advantage that you don't need to use a 2.6 kernel and the 3.2.x drivers. I wasn't implying that the method I posted would work with Xinerama, I've never used it so I wouldn't know anyway._________________Per Ardua Ad Astra
The Earth is the cradle of the mind, but we cannot live forever in a cradle - Konstantin E. TsiolkovskyGentoo Radeon FAQ

They should work fine on a 2.4 kernel. The reason I mentioned them together was because that driver/kernel combination works with AGP 8x on the KT400(A) boards. The patch you posted seems to work with the 3.2.x drivers, so there's nothing stopping you from trying them out on 2.4.22 if you want to. Sorry for the mixup _________________Per Ardua Ad Astra
The Earth is the cradle of the mind, but we cannot live forever in a cradle - Konstantin E. TsiolkovskyGentoo Radeon FAQ

In another related thread somewhere Wedge pointed out that you may have to add a second, chipset-specific agp module to modules.autoload. For me this was exactly what I needed to get X back up. I typed

Quote:

find /usr/src/linux -iname *agp*

, found that I needed to add via-agp to the file (i put it after agpgart and before fglrx). Now everything works fine again.

Thanks for posting that It should only affect 2.6 kernels, if you're running 2.4.x then the agpgart module is all you need._________________Per Ardua Ad Astra
The Earth is the cradle of the mind, but we cannot live forever in a cradle - Konstantin E. TsiolkovskyGentoo Radeon FAQ

I have tried these drivers in gentoo and it seems as if the fps is terrible with my radeon 9500 pro. 2.9 is pretty bad but has better fps than 3.2. (i havent tried .4). The problem is that 2.9's drivers make my game wolfenstein et cause xfree to lockup (sometimes) when gl extensions is enabled. I might be able to play for 30 minutes before lockup or it might lockup within the first minute of the gameplay. I get like 20fps and sometimes 10 fps with 3.2. in wolfet. I seem to remember the drivers to be faster in mandrake but i might have been using 3.2.4. ut2k3 has fps of like 10 at 1024 768 w/ the 2.9 and 3.2

Are you sure everything is working properly? Does glxinfo show that direct rendering is enabled? Have you done "opengl-update ati"?_________________Per Ardua Ad Astra
The Earth is the cradle of the mind, but we cannot live forever in a cradle - Konstantin E. TsiolkovskyGentoo Radeon FAQ

solution:
lookup the pci chipid of your gfx chip at http://pciids.sourceforge.net/iii/. if you have e.g. a radeon 9800, you should select vendor id 1002 for ATI, then search for "radeon 9800". for the radeon 9800 you'll see that it has the chipid 0x4e48.
now issue the command lspci.

if the output is similar to the above (i.e. the chipid of your chip is different from the one in the database) you've probably found the reason of your problem.

how to fix it:

first emerge your choice of ati-drivers and do fglrxconfig.
then edit your newly generated /etc/X11/XF86Config-4 and add the option ChipID [the chipid you found in the db] in section device. for example:

now copy the distfile of your driver into a subdir of your homedir and untar it. cd into its lib/modules/fglrx/build_mod directory. now you should apply any agp8x patches if you need to.

then hexedit libfglrx_ip.a.GCC3. search for the chipid you found in the pci database. you might have to respect endianness issues. e.g. if the chipid is 0x4e48 you might have to search for 0x484e. you'll probably find it near the end of the binary (this is the .data section i think). change this value to the chipid displayed by lspci. remember to think of endianness!

save the binary and compile the module. you should now be able to insmod it. copy it over /lib/modules/yourkernel/video/fglrx.o (i know this is quite a dirty hack but it worx )

The following will only work for the new 3.2.x series of the ati-drivers, because tv-out feature has been enabled only now in the drivers. To enable tv-out start the fglrxconfig program

Code:

/opt/ati/bin/fglrxconfig

When prompted for tv-out say yes

Code:

Do you want to enable TV out (y/n)? [n] y

Next enter your tv-norm (for Germany I entered PAL-D)

The next option is the Screen Layout, enter Clone-Mode (Option 3), Others will not work.

Next comes Monitor Settings, leave this at auto detect (Option 1)

Select the remaining options to your gusto.

Edit the resulting XF86Config-4 and change the two options HSync2 and VRefresh2 to

Code:

Option "HSync2" ""
Option "VRefresh2" ""

Delete the section for Monitor1

Code:

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Monitor1"

[...]

EndSection

This configuration worked for me (Radeon 9500, Athlon XP 1700+, gentoo-kernel 2.4.20-r6 and vanilla-kernel 2.4.22). There were no issues using internal or external AGPGART. Xv extension does not work on the tv-screen, so no hardware-scaling will be supported on tv. If the image is black and white, maybe your tv only supports composite signals, ati cards provide only s-video output, so you'll need a special s-video to composite converter. With my card the converter was included (small s-video to cinch cable).

I found that the 3.2.4 drivers are A LOT faster than 2.9 in ut2k3 when using the fastFFS "1" fix. also, i rarely get under 20 fps with enemy territory(actually i think et was running without the fix so i might get higher when i try again). average of 30-40. I have a 9500 pro and pentium4 1.6ghz processor. I am using one of the fixes but If i restart my computer, i have to reinstall et or i will get a black screen without the game when i try to start et. Is anyone getting better frame rates with similar hardware,? What are you doing to improve performance?

What's this FastFFS fix you mentioned? I've never heard of it I don't play ET (not much fun on 56k), but in RTCW, at 1024x768@32, all details turned up, the framerate stays up around 90 or whatever the default limit is. It will sometimes drop down drastically to ~20-30 at times, but mostly it's fine._________________Per Ardua Ad Astra
The Earth is the cradle of the mind, but we cannot live forever in a cradle - Konstantin E. TsiolkovskyGentoo Radeon FAQ

RTCW? Ive never heard of it. Quake has has always had superb framerates for me.

RTCW = Return to Castle Wolfenstein, ET was originally going to be an addon for it, so they should be very similar in terms of performance.

gentooalex wrote:

The fastffs was in the first post. I might have used the wrong word but it sounds like what i said.

FastTLS?

Have you tried running with UseInternalAGPGART set to both "no" and "yes" to see if there's any difference in performance? There isn't any for me (nForce2 board), but that might not be true for all chipsets._________________Per Ardua Ad Astra
The Earth is the cradle of the mind, but we cannot live forever in a cradle - Konstantin E. TsiolkovskyGentoo Radeon FAQ

return to castle wolfenstein isnt as demanding on graphics. RTCW is more sparse compared to et even though et was based on the same engine. I dont know how different they are though. When there is a lot going on i might go down to 20-30 fps but other than that i get pretty good frame rates since enabling all the options specified in the howto. I found 3.2.4 drivers to be faster than 2.9 thoiugh and the howto says just the opposite is the case.

ATI have just released some new official drivers, version 3.2.5, so you might want to try them. They're on ati.com._________________Per Ardua Ad Astra
The Earth is the cradle of the mind, but we cannot live forever in a cradle - Konstantin E. TsiolkovskyGentoo Radeon FAQ

I just finally got 3.2.4 to work. lol. I wonder when an ebuild will be made for these. I dont know how to install an rpm in gentoo. Hopefully these will have huge fps improvements.
I dont know what they mean by "Many 3D fixes"

3.2.5
fixed in this release:

* Many 3D fixes
* Many bugs fixed

New Features in this release:

* TV Out Support
* PseudoColor Support
* Support for Many cards added
* Full Screen Anti Aliasing Support (FSAA)